| Matter of Town of Cheektowaga (Cheektowaga Police Club,Inc.) |
| 2009 NY Slip Op 00842 [59 AD3d 993] |
| February 6, 2009 |
| Appellate Division, Fourth Department |
| In the Matter of the Arbitration between Town of Cheektowaga,Appellant, and Cheektowaga Police Club, Inc., Respondent. |
—[*1] Anthony J. DeMarie, Williamsville, for respondent-respondent.
Appeal from an order and judgment (one paper) of the Supreme Court, Erie County (DianeY. Devlin, J.), entered April 30, 2008 in a proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 75. The orderand judgment denied the petition for a permanent stay of arbitration.
It is hereby ordered that the order and judgment so appealed from is unanimously affirmedwithout costs.
Memorandum: Petitioner appeals from an order and judgment denying its petition for apermanent stay of arbitration pursuant to CPLR 7503 (b). We affirm. Respondent, therepresentative for Cheektowaga police officers below the rank of lieutenant, filed a demand forarbitration concerning petitioner's decision to promote one officer to the rank of lieutenantinstead of a second officer, based on the second officer's residence outside the Town ofCheektowaga. Because neither party challenges the propriety of arbitrating such a dispute, theonly issue before us is whether respondent's claim falls within the scope of the parties' collectivebargaining agreement (CBA), and we conclude that it does inasmuch as it is reasonably relatedto the subject matter of the CBA (seeMatter of City of Watertown v Watertown Firefighters, Local 191, 6 AD3d 1095[2004]; Matter of Odessa-Montour Cent. School Dist. [Odessa-Montour Teachers Assn.],271 AD2d 931, 932 [2000]). "Where, as here, there is a broad arbitration clause and a 'reasonablerelationship' between the subject matter of the dispute and the general subject matter of theparties' [CBA], the court 'should rule the matter arbitrable, and the arbitrator will then make amore exacting interpretation of the precise scope of the substantive provisions of the [CBA], andwhether the subject matter of the dispute fits within them' " (Matter of Van Scoy[Holder], 265 AD2d 806, 807-808 [1999], quoting Matter of Board of Educ. ofWatertown City School Dist. [Watertown Educ. Assn.], 93 NY2d 132, 143 [1999]).Present—Scudder, P.J., Hurlbutt, Peradotto and Gorski, JJ.